


Survival Was Not His to Take

by TheBirbiest



Category: RWBY
Genre: And then this happened, Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Major Injury, bit of a darker, depressing fic piece, i had some thoughts about james losing his body parts, please be mindful of tags, tw: body horror, tw: gore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-07
Updated: 2020-04-07
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:15:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23526757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheBirbiest/pseuds/TheBirbiest
Summary: The day James Ironwood lost a piece of himself, was the day the man realized what true fear is. What it's like to be left alone. What it's like to be the only survivor and not give a damn about it.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12





	Survival Was Not His to Take

The screams filled the night air; echoing around him and vibrating against each and every bone in his body. He huffed heavily as he whipped around in time to meet another Beowolf, his revolver raised and fired before the creature took another step. Turning back around, he finds soldiers, his men, his _companions,_ overrun by the howling and screeching monsters of Grimm. He’d never seen so many gathered in one location before, but when the first horde arrived it became very clear to him, very quickly, that something was wrong. Very, **very** wrong.

“Fall back!”

Several sets of eyes lift at the sound of his voice, but their sense of duty clashes against their fear. After all, they were sent here to clear the area of Grimm. To save those that may have survived. 

_If_ they survived.

_**“Now!”**_

The second command is obeyed - the squadron lifting their own weapons and firing rapidly at the beasts surrounding them; their legs carrying them toward their airship. The young general takes a step toward them and just barely catches sight of the Griffon swooping down from the sky. His breath catches in his throat momentarily, several _other_ winged Grimm following behind their leader.

“Get down!”

_“Sabyr!”_

“What?!”

He turns toward the voice, one of his own teammates, Addy, pointing her shotgun in the opposite direction. 

“Lots of ‘em!” She adds loudly, the Griffon slicing through the air above her; their cries clashing violently with those of the men surrounding her. The men behind her. The men behind _him._

He turns back around frantically; _‘Due Process’_ raised and fired rapidly at the Grimm clouding around the men trying to fight back. He manages to kill several, if not most, of the Griffon, but the number of casualties is more than alarming.

“Addy--!”

“I _know,_ James!”

Without another word, she begins firing several rounds at the charging beasts. Following her lead, he turns back around and lifts both of his revolvers; adjusting _‘Balance’_ behind him. He blocks out the screams behind him; the frantic, desperate shouts for aid that will either never make it in time or not risk coming to their aid. He focuses on the enemy he hopes to fend off and clear a path for escape. For _any_ survivors. And, with any luck, he may be one of them.

Firing his revolver, he propels himself forward with a shout. _‘Due Process’_ fires a bullet at a Sabyr’s skull; killing it instantly. The next shot lands in a Sabyr’s leg, causing it to topple over. This shot, however, does little to stop it as the creature rushes back onto all fours and sets its sights on him. 

James fires several more rounds at the oncoming rush of Sabyr Grimm, but keeps the wounded, charging target in his peripheral vision. When it presses in, mere feet away from the man, he swivels quickly; planting his foot into the side of its head. The creature slides off to the side, whining loudly. He follows it, not allowing it the chance to get up for another attack, and aims his revolvers at its gut. The cry erupts from its lips and James recognizes that it won’t last another round. He fires a final time, but the shot misses as claws sink into his shoulder; a cry of his own spilling out into the air.

“James!”

He hears Addy, but his focus remains on the creature grabbing hold of him, lifting him into the sky. He fires several, rapid shots at the Griffon and is rewarded with its speedy death, its body disintegrating into the air. Falling back toward the ground, he only has time to fear the landing before the wounded Sabyr charges from the corner of his vision. He points his revolver at the enemy, prepares to fire, and is more than a little alarmed when another set of claws grab hold of him. He shouts out immediately; pain erupting in his shoulder like a firecracker. The Sabyr is suddenly upon him as well; teeth grabbing hold of his right leg. 

The next set of events happen so rapidly, the man barely registers what happens. 

The Griffon pulls back, attempting to lift into the air, as the Sabyr pulls down, wishing to drag its prey to common ground. The combined actions pull a sound from James that he doesn’t recognize, but he recognizes the scream from Addy. 

“JAMES!”

Her shotgun fires.

The world stops.

And for just a few, short seconds, James can’t breathe. Can’t function. Everything within him silences in the wake of the oncoming storm. 

His body drops to the ground like a ragdoll; head bouncing off the frozen earth. He inhales sharply, flicking his eyes to the Sabyr just as it disintegrates. He hears Addy’s scream once again, his eyes lifting to find her long, red braid just minutes before she plummets to the ground; a Beowolf on top of her.

He opens his mouth to speak.

He moves to sit up. 

To assist. 

But it’s this moment, when the world is moving violent and rapidly, when the screams around him sound miles away, that James sees it. That James _recognizes_ it. 

His body reacts before he has time to understand; violent tremors racing through him. Eyes blown wide and lower lip trembling; the warmth of blood spilling from the corner of his mouth.

A hand reaches slowly toward his thigh, his mind racing.

_That isn’t…_

_But how…_

_Why is my leg…_

He inhales with a fear that follows the sudden dip of fingers, just barely above where his knee _**should**_ be.

He feels the exposed flesh. The muscle and tissue. The blood and bone.

Pain swallows him whole; drowning him in a kind of horror he’s never known before. A scream erupts from him as ragged, rapid breaths twist him into a state of shock. Nothing else feels real in that moment. Nothing else exists outside of the realization that his _**leg**_ lay several feet away from him, detached from his body. The warmth of the blood pressing against his fingers, spilling from what’s left of the limb, feels too warm. Too thick. Too _heavy._

“Agh!”

A Beowolf crashes onto him, claws plunging into his shoulder and ripping another scream from his body. He’s jolted back into the reality of the situation; his missing leg momentarily forgotten over the screams that rush back into his ears. The sudden teeth that one jerk of his head saves him from.

He grabs blindly for _‘Due Process,’_ feeling nothing as he finds it. Long, sharp claws drag down his arm as a set of teeth bury themselves into his flesh. He presses the weapon against the beast’s skull and fires without hesitation; the throbbing, nauseating pain in his shoulder following its death. 

He pants heavily, allowing his arm to fall limp across his chest; fingers still wrapped around the gun. Everything is suddenly too loud. Too far away. Too close. 

The pain is like nothing he’s ever felt before. Moans turn into strangled wheezes. Screams burble free, thick with blood. His hand presses against the missing leg, fingers flinching at the edge of the wound. At the space that’s no longer there.

Sapphire orbs aim themselves at the shattered moon above him. He hears Addy’s voice. Another Grimm. A soldier. A civilian. 

His eyes sag closed. 

His chest stutters with breaths that drag themselves free.

When his eyelids lift again, the world is silent. Breathing in slow, uneven breaths, the man continues to stare at the moon. Just for an extra moment or two. Just long enough to realize he can no longer feel his arm, but he _feels_ the empty weight of his thigh. 

His eyes burn with tears that arise from both fear and grief. Realization and despair. 

“...A...Addy…?”

The voice that leaves him isn’t his. It can’t possibly be his own. Even still, he’s grateful that it speaks. Finds strength where he cannot. 

There’s a new kind of despair, however, that follows the silence meeting the voice. The uncomfortable quiet to the world that solidifies what he fears most. 

“...please…”

Tears spill over his cheeks as he resists the urge to turn his head. To witness, for himself, the damage done to his body. The missing pieces of himself. The blood pouring out around him, staining the pristine white a terrifying red. 

His body jerks; voice tangling in his throat as a violent tremor renders him silent. Blood sputters over his lips a sob breaks free; broken and muffled. He inhales powerfully as soon as the fit ends, his head rolling to his left side. What he sees, however, does little to comfort him. To quiet the building unease and hopelessness within him.

Bodies lay scattered across Fodlan, the small, heartwarming village that he’d grown to love and adore ever since he was a child. Citizens, soldiers, adults, children; all of them painted the once lively area with their corpses. The marks of Grimm were present on the buildings, on the ice, on the bodies. 

Another sob spills free as the cold seeps into his bones. As the reality of the situation sinks even deeper. 

His eyelids sag; fluttering only in response to the powerful, burning will to keep himself awake. To keep _all of this_ saved to memory. To remind him of the events that transpired. 

He didn’t deserve to stay alive.

But he deserved to remember all of this as his greatest failure. 

To his men.

To the people of Fodlan.

And to _all_ of Solitas.

He doesn’t remember how long he lay like that, eyes fixated on the dead. Mind emptied and body numb. Whenever his eyelids sank too far, nearly blocking out the world around him, his Semblance, Endurance, bled into his veins as a slow, momentary warmth. It hastened his breathing for just a few, short minutes. Kept his chest rising and falling. Lifted his eyelids. 

It was because of _this,_ that the man lasted long enough to see a group of soldiers hurrying onto the scene; all of them shouting out different commands. Each one checking the bodies, commenting on the devastation, sounding disappointed when the answer was always the same; _‘Dead…’_

“Wait a minute--”

“Over here! We have a survivor!”

The voices were little relief as the wounded soldier watched them approach, breaths leaving in nothing but wheezes and moans. He felt their hands upon him, body tensing and shouts already spilling over trembled lips.

“It’s Ironwood! And he’s-- he’s in bad shape. Someone contact…”

The voice drifted away from the screams that erupted from the injured man; his body lifted from the ground and placed onto a stretcher. The sobs came more readily now, soft words of reassurance echoed at his side, but none of the voices soothed him. None of the words chosen or the tones taken made him feel any less of a failure. 

Any less than the man that got hundreds of people killed in a single night.

A breathing mask wraps around his face and as his breaths puff against it, he feels sleep pull a bit harder. Lull him into a sense of ease now that he was among others. Now that he wasn’t alone.

But perhaps being alone wouldn’t have been so bad. 

Perhaps if he let go a bit sooner, he could have died alongside his men, alongside his companions, and found solace in a death he deserved, rather than a survival that did not belong to him.


End file.
